


In the Black

by aurora_ff



Category: Black Widow (Comics), Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Winter Soldier (Comics)
Genre: Avengers: Infinity War Lead-Up, Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Trailer, BuckyNat Secret Santa, F/M, POV Natasha Romanov, Possible Spoilers, Recovered Memories, Speculation, Wakanda
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-11
Updated: 2018-01-11
Packaged: 2019-03-03 15:33:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,887
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13344171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aurora_ff/pseuds/aurora_ff
Summary: BuckyNat Secret Santa gift for the great artist@noceknocek's prompt: what good thing will happen for them in infinity war (or generally mcu)Summary: As the Wakandan neuro-scientists and Shuri work to free Bucky Barnes of his HYDRA programming, they have unexpected help in Natasha. Awoken, Bucky's memories of his Soviet days as the Winter Soldier begin to return, but he struggles finding the way to tell Natasha that he recalls something of a shared past. The Earth is suddenly threatened by Thanos, so however will he find the time as they battle aliens?Avengers: Infinity War speculation for our assassin-duo, also the hint of a possible reunion. Obsessively compliant with all current MCU films (even Age of Ultron - yuck), because that's how I roll.





	In the Black

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nocek](https://archiveofourown.org/gifts?recipient=nocek).



> Update: Febrary 2018: Obviously, this is all blown out of the water with Black Panther and the last post-credit scene. I'd make Shuri a little more impish and playful. Also, change the settings of Bucky's awakening. (Still not convinced that Bucky isn't in some sort of mindscape, developed by Shuri and her team to evaluate him.)

Bravo. Whiskey. Eight. Alpha. Tango. Charlie.

Natasha’s abraded fingers worked deliberately at the special transponder as she squacked her code for the incoming cloaked quinjet over the equally cloaked Wakandan airspace. She was beyond tired and had a few cracked ribs, numerous bruises, and several shallow lacerations. But her hosts insisted that she must declare herself for each and every exit and entry she requested.

Who would have thought there was a whole nation more secretive than her?

The Wakandans were used to holding back. Obfuscating. Nastasha understood. Their land held treasures beyond measure.

Her own secret was below as well. Locked away at his own insistence. She had only gazed at Barnes briefly in his cryo-freeze. Staring more could have broken her resolve to keep her distance.

Natasha glance at the briefcase and the promised contents behind her seat. A key, possibly, to stripping him of the last of HYDRA's work. 

She piloted another slow loop over the dense jungle. 

“Please,” she muttered under her breath, alone at the coms. “Let me in.”

In another three heartbeats, Natasha had a sigil of _’Affirmative’_ transmitted back, and the obscuring veil below her aircraft parted, the mists separating at a three-hundred meters down to a landing pad elevated from the jungle.

She sighed. Finally, Natasha could switch to autopilot.

* * *

Natasha and her payload were met by Nakia and one Wakandan medic. She never told the slight woman that she called her _’Sestra’_ , Sister, in her thoughts after Natasha learned that she was a prominent undercover agent for her homeland. Her fellow spy’s face was a beacon through her pain as Nat clenched the case and did her best not to limp off the quinjet’s ramp.

“You are hurt,” Nakia observed in English, reaching for the satchel. “Let me take this.”

“No,” Natasha protested. “It goes to Princess Shuri. No other.”

Nakia relented but not before looping her elbow in Natasha’s own to steady her. “Not even Steve Rogers?” A flick of the eye, a small quirk of a smile. “If you are allies, why do you hide this?”

“It’s not his concern,” Natasha deflected, gritting through another unpleasant pang from her ribs, as they walked to the lift that would take her off the roof and down into the medical facility-turned-headquarters for the refugees that were of the remnants of the Avengers who had bucked the Accords’ oversight.

“Your actions in Berlin would suggest otherwise.” Nakia knew of all of Natasha’s deeds perpetrated in those fateful hours in Germany. How Natasha gave T’Chaka the advice to track Sharon and then Tony, playing the King-Apparent into intervening and finding the true perpetrator of his father’s death.

Letting Cap and Bucky Barnes go? It wasn’t just keeping her friends alive and free. It wasn’t just loyalty to Cap after the Triskelion and the Potomac. It was something deeper within her. Irrational, dangerous, ancient and tragic.

Neither Nakia nor T’Challa were fools.

“If Her Highness can work with this, he’ll have his friend back. That’s what matters,” Natasha deflected, half-doubting her own words.

In the high-tech elevator, Nakia waved her hand over some console, and they began to descend. 

Nakia took another tack, casually. “To certain Russians in certain circles, you are a legend. A few call you...what is it? The Red Death. So changing your hair before you went back? A good call, I should say.”

“Being a wanted woman within every country but yours? It required a makeover,” Natasha returned, nonchalantly. With her dyed blonde hair slicked back and pulled into a low ponytail, she barely recognized herself in the metal reflections of the elevator.

As the lift slowed and the doors opened to a middle floor of the facility, Nakia gave one last nod before ushering her companion to its corridors. “Perhaps one day you won’t need to hide.”

* * *

Patched up by the Wakandans, Natasha waited outside the medical suite that kept Barnes in his cryogenic sleep. She didn’t come here often. Not like Steve, who visited his comatose friend every day when he was not on a mission, regardless of ‘progress’ or not. 

A hiss of a pneumatic door. “Miss Romanoff?” the technician greeted formally.

Taking her delivery from the seat beside her, Natasha rose slowly.

Princess Shuri was in the same uniform as the other neuroscientists, working at a console nearby the slightly-inclined tube. “Nakia says you’ve recovered something that may help with the patient’s treatment.” She only spared a glance at Natasha before continuing with her diagnostics.

“Steve said that you weren’t having much luck with his HYDRA conditioning,” she began.

“It was a shame that so much was destroyed in Syberia. I’m told you had a lead on another imprinting protocol?”

Natasha set the briefcase on its side on top of the console. “It’s a Soviet variant...perhaps two or three versions back from his last with Pierce. I don’t know what you’ll find, but perhaps the difference can give you some clues.”

Shuri smiled gently, resting her hand on the case as if the contents of drives and circuit-boards could tell her something just by their proximity before she used her thumbprint to unlock it. “Yet you insist we do not tell Captain Rogers of this development, which is puzzling given that you certainly risked your life to obtain it.”

How easily Natasha wove her truth with her deceptions. “I don’t want to give him false hope. There’s no telling what may be of value there. It may be just junk or failsafe contingencies of the exceptionally violent type.”

“Ah,” the Wakandan princess noted, studying the tech with her eyes. “We will be exceptionally careful and delicate, then, in the matter.”

“Thank you,” Natasha offered, knowing that once she got the answer she wanted -- needed?, it was best to step away.

As she walked back to the exit, she pressed her hand to the cold glass that retained Barnes as she passed. The condensation left an outline of her handprint for only as long as it took the doors to shut behind her.

* * *

Months passed. The exiled Avengers continued to work in the shadows. Natasha focused on her present. 

Until one evening, Sam came to her quarters. “They’re gonna wake him up tonight,” he told her. She understood without asking that Steve was probably glued to Bucky's side.

“I see,” Natasha replied-without-replying.

“Her Highness thought you may want to observe,” he continued, leaning on her door-jam. “You can stay with me and her on the other side of significant reinforcement...just in case, you know, he goes all Winter Soldier…”

Her heartbeat began to race. Anticipation. Fear. Doubt. If she wasn’t there, would she regret it? If she was...could she hold it together? 

“I suppose I should watch,” she agreed. “The end of a chapter and all.”

* * *

Through the one-way glass, Natasha waited side by side with Sam as James Buchanan Barnes’ elegant cryo-chamber was brought into the windowless secure room on the other side. The man within was still, but there was no longer the hint of frost on the tube’s glass. Steve was his only companion as the door to the containment room sealed.

“They’ve been keeping him in a dream-like state for a while, monitoring and doing the high-tech hocus-pocus to remove all that HYDRA brainwashing,” Sam summarized quietly, likely from all that Steve had told him, confided in him.

Shuri announced to both rooms over speaker. “Initiating transition from theta to beta waking-state." Her hands moved dance-like over the control console.

In a minute, the dark-haired man began to blink slowly. His pupils, monitored by the techs via remote camera, began to constrict in response to the light. A press of a button slid the glass of the chamber away. Steve would be the very first thing that Barnes would see.

“Hey, Buck,” he said, voice modulated soothingly, though Natasha could detect the deep emotion that threatened to choke him. "Rise and shine."

Barnes swallowed and gazed specifically at the face of his friend. Everyone one in the observation room was holding their breath.

“What?” Bucky whispered, his voice rough with disuse. “No predawn reveille included?” He smiled just a bit, as if it had been some in-joke from long ago.

Steve grinned, absolutely beamed. It was the happiest Natasha had seen him in years. “Later. If you want.” 

Barnes clenched and unclenched his single fist, rolled his shoulders as he worked to gain control of his muscles again. “What year is it?”

“A good sign,” Sam whispered to Natasha.

Steve answered. “Two-thousand-and-eighteen. Hey, take it slow, pal!”

Barnes began to pull himself out of the chamber, straining. “Been in this thing long enough,” he grunted, finally switching to take Steve’s hand for the final step out. Although there was an exam table a step away where he could sit, he simply braced himself on his friend as his legs steadied.

“They're gonna want to do tests,” Steve remarked.

“I know.” The dark-haired man sighed. He then looked further at his surroundings, and his eyes locked in on the mirror. “Who’s there?” he asked.

“The Wakandan scientists that have been treating you. Princess Shuri. Sam and Natasha, too.”

Bucky parted with Steve and took a small, shuffling step towards the observation glass, and then another. Each footfall was more confident and strong until he stood inches away from his own reflection. A mere couple of feet from her on the other side. It was if he could see through it. Natasha could not look away, searching, seeking something in his eyes.

“Thanks, everyone,” he offered. “I owe you.”

“They’re working on another arm for you, too,” Steve said to the back of his best friend, regaining his attention.

“For when, and if, I’ve been cleared?” Barnes knew what a security risk he could be, fully powered.

“I’m sorry, Buck. That’s --”

An electronic ringtone suddenly emanated from Steve’s pants pocket. Buck turned around.

Natasha and Sam gave each other knowing looks. They knew what that phone call could mean. 

Cap fished it out and looked at the number on the ancient flip-phone’s screen.

“Better pick up,” Bucky urged, his face clouded. “If that’s who I think it is.”

“I’ll be right back.” The Wakandans opened the door and Steve stepped out of the chamber, with a half-guilty look plastered on his face, certainly from leaving Bucky alone to take the call of the man that nearly killed them both in a fit of blind revenge.

Bucky returned to his one-sided conversation with those behind the mirror. “You better make those tests quick.”

* * *

World-ending threats did not leave time for delicate probes of her own into the depths of Barnes’ reconstructed memory. Natasha didn’t even get a moment alone with Shuri to inquire what she had found from the recovered tech. It wouldn’t matter if she couldn’t live beyond this newest crisis.

Natasha was gearing up within her ready-room, selecting her Black Widow’s tech for their mission to safeguard Vision and Wanda, when there was a request for entry. “Come,” she stated as she zipped up a boot, thinking it was Steve or Sam.

The door opened. It was Barnes, still without a left arm. They must have rushed his mental stability tests.

“Hi,” he began, awkwardly.

Later, Natasha thought. They could talk about all the times he tried to kill her _later._ “What’s up, Barnes? Please just spit it out, cause I’m headed to Europe in five minutes.”

“Can I...borrow a rifle? And a pistol or two?” So, that was it.

“Wakandan tech a little ahead of your time, Sergeant?” If nothing else, she had two relics to tease now. When Barnes seemed to struggle with whether she had given him permission with the quip, Natasha waved her hand at her extensive arsenal. “Help yourself to anything you can carry.”

“Thanks.”

She watched him out of the corner of her eye take stock of his choices, then gravitate to the M249s, the same she kept in her quinjet locker. He always did prefer the American-made arms.

As Natasha put on her gauntlets, Barnes examined the rifle as best he could. “You keep these in excellent condition,” he remarked.

Her stomach did a backflip. “I learned from the best,” was her reply as she headed to the door, determined to keep on her Black Widow game-face.

“Romanoff!” he called.

“Now what?” It was unwise to go into the field distracted. Certainly, he remembered that rule from his former life.

His uncertainty evaporated. He met her in the eye, saluting with the rifle in his grip. “Good hunting.”

* * *

Their last stand would be in Wakanda, Cap determined with T’Challa, gathering all that were left to fight. Natasha was bone tired. Sore in some places, numb in others. Defending the Earth against this Titan, this Thanos, left her a husk. Banner’s return to Earth did nothing except revive her guilt at unilaterally putting the Avenger’s mission success in Sokovia before whatever-it-could-have-been.

The balcony of the Wakandan spire gave her an excellent view of their chosen battleground. All to do now was wait for the mustering call. At least this way, Natasha mused, she’d meet her death among soldiers and warriors rather than by ambush and an unceremonious dumping in an unmarked grave. One more opportunity to put the balance of the ledger in her favor.

She knew the sound of Barnes’ steps. He, too, was suited up for battle, her MK249 strapped to his back. He hadn’t even time for a shave.

“How’s the new arm?” she made as small-chat as he went to the railing on her right, gazing at the jungle and grasslands as she did.

He held it up, the plates a gunmetal bluish-black, the tendon-like underpinnings hinting at gold. “Will take a little getting used to. I still expect to look down and see that star.”

Natasha nodded. “That part of your life’s all over with now. Done.”

“The thing is...” Barnes began, speaking slowly. “I--”

The city-wide alarm split through the air, cutting him off. They both tensed.

“We need to go!” Natasha shouted over the siren.

He frowned and nodded. They strode side-by-side quickly down the corridors to the lifts. The other Avengers, along with King T’Challa and a few of the Dora Milaje, were some paces ahead. Steve looked back and upon seeing Natasha and Bucky, he gave his commander’s nod.

The alarm-noise was not so deafening in the hallways.

“You should be by his side,” Natasha remarked. Like he and Cap were and should be again, blood-brothers until the end.

“Not yet. Not until you stop and listen to me, because I may never get another chance. And I don’t want to die not having said it.” 

Such drama. She had her fill of it for one day. Natasha kept on walking.

”Natalia, _stop_. Please.”

Well, that froze her in her tracks. She never thought to hear that name ever touching his tongue again. It disarmed her in ways she could never overcome.

When she turned and looked at him, he had a small frown on his lips as he gazed down at the space between them. “There was so much ugliness for so long with the Russians. But I know you were there, somehow. Fighting for my humanity even when it was impossible to secure my freedom,” He then looked up at the ceiling, and there seemed a glimmer of tears in his lashes. “You...God. You were the only fucking _good_ thing in all of it.”

Natasha couldn’t think of what to say. For years-upon-years she had barely dared to hope, hated that her mistakes had been the cause of his further torment. If she uncorked it all, she’d drown in the flood of her own making. “You have horrible timing, Barnes,” she began. Also, she admitted, “Steve doesn’t know.”

“How about you and I put that on the list of problems to address _after_ the incoming alien horde,” he quipped, going from down-right serious to devil-may-care in all of two heartbeats. He motioned for them to catch up with a tilt of his head.

“Sure,” she agreed as she started to jog back to the group, recalling to herself what it was like to partner with the Soldier. How they became all-business when the time was needed.

He kept up easily. “One last thing, though.” 

“Yeah?” 

They were about to turn a corner and be within earshot again. He overcame her and ran backward, locking eyes with her. He gave a small, perhaps fond, private smile. Just a glimmer.“Considering all that I think happened, could you start calling me James?”

Before she could answer, he cleared his throat and turned around again to shoulder his way through to Steve. Natasha fell in behind Okoye.

“What was that about?” Cap asked Bucky as they all crowded into the lift.

“Thanking Natasha for all the times she saved your ass while I was under,” he lied.

“Hey!” Sam spoke up, feigning offense. “What about _my_ thanks?!” 

“Sorry, Sam,” Steve defended his oldest friend. “You may be a lot of things, but you aren’t a redhead.”

Natasha smiled to herself. One of the first things she would do, once the planet was safe again and she managed to survive, was to make a date with a different bottle of hair color.


End file.
